It also revealed the NSW Government has been actively considering plans, in discussion with irrigators, to abandon the water management plan altogether and allegations that some irrigators in the Barwon-Darling had masked the amount of water they had drawn from the river.

In response, ABC rural and regional reporters fanned out across the catchment to speak with the people it directly affects — its leaders, irrigators, farmers and first people.

It is the last honour that she is well known for in her district, in irrigation circles and in the halls of Parliament House in Canberra.

Ms Gaske was horrified to hear that while her district — stretching out over 30,000-plus kilometres from Bollon in the west to St George and south to Dirranbandi — has done the hard yards in water recovery in recent years, there were those just south of the border taking hard won environmental flows.

"I think that the shepherding of environmental water across jurisdictions has been and always will be one of the challenges to the ultimate success to the plan," she said.

"In our community, particularly in Dirranbandi, we see empty shop fronts, we see families leave, we see school numbers drop. That's the fabric of our community. To visit a town and not see that any more, that's devastating."

He says the community is on its knees as a result of water buybacks and the main street of 'Dirran — as it's known locally — is a far cry from its heyday.

He was part of a social media campaign earlier this year run by Cotton Australia, the National Farmers Federation and other farming groups to try to end further environmental water buybacks under the basin plan.

Mr McCosker says while the Four Corners program came across as balanced, he is worried about the wider perception of irrigators.

Although there was no mention of his district, he still feels like irrigators have been blamed as a group.

He says he has lost faith in the Murray-Darling Basin Plan.

"It's pretty devastating," he said.

"Everybody's done the right thing here, the water that's been given back has been supposedly going downstream to help the river in the other areas, but nothing's happened, has it? It's all been taken, hasn't it?"